At San Jose’s Vietnam Town, struggling merchants find it hard to recognize their signature commercial center. Instead, they see a plaza that chases out visitors.
It’s eerily quiet during the day. The ramps of Vietnam Town’s main parking garage have been cordoned off with dumpsters, choking out parking options for would-be customers. Security is towing cars out of the center’s few remaining spaces while rampant break-ins force shops to cover their windows with plywood. Meanwhile, construction work has carved out long, continuous strips of stucco across multiple storefronts for reasons that have merchants mystified.
“Our small businesses are dying, our customers cannot find parking and we’ve sent multiple complaints to the board that manages us, and have gotten no response,” Harry Nguyen, co-owner of Pho Ha Noi — the Vietnam Town restaurant with celebrity acclaim — told San José Spotlight.
Vietnam Town is a unique shopping center. The businesses purchase their space as condos and are beholden to HOA-type monthly dues.
Now those owners are banding together, filing a lawsuit against the plaza management board and some of its former leaders, known as the Vietnam Town Condominium Owners Association. The organization collects about $400 monthly per shop in exchange for support services such as on-site security. But the Nov. 4 lawsuit alleges the board has been doing the opposite. In addition to monthly fees, the board is accused of unfairly levying fines on eateries for using outdoor common areas while favoring certain businesses with discounted association dues.
Vietnam Town business owners say plaza management is needlessly choking out foot traffic through the puzzling closure of the main parking garage to customers. Photo by Brandon Pho.
Jason Tran, owner of Vietnam Town’s Pho This Way, said the board’s priorities are out of whack. He and other merchants are particularly vexed by onerous parking rules on spaces in front of shops that have enabled aggressive towing of shoppers’ cars, leaving customers on the hook for impound fees.
“We have seen tow trucks literally waiting in the parking lot on standby,” Tran told San José Spotlight. “That’s upset a lot of customers.”
The lawsuit argues a majority of Vietnam Town business owners are in favor of major changes to the membership of the association’s board of directors.
“Inexplicably, all of the board members have kept their positions despite being disliked,” the merchants’ lawsuit reads.
One former board member named in the lawsuit is the plaza’s original developer, Lap Tang. But Tang asserts the merchants’ complaint is targeting him erroneously.
While Tang was Vietnam Town’s visionary — and had plans to develop the plaza of faux-Tuscan buildings and huge pillars further — he filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2013 after hitting problems with construction loans. The project and Vietnam Town’s remaining unsold spots were handed to another developer, SingHaiyi Group, which announced in 2014 it would build the second phase of the Vietnam Town development.
“I have nothing to do with the current HOA in Vietnam Town, no relationship,” Tang, who owns numerous business spaces at the plaza, told San José Spotlight. “I do not personally know the new ownership of the Vietnam Town project.”
Jason Mao, the representative for the new builder who’s also named in the lawsuit, didn’t respond to requests for comment. Neither did the other plaza board members included in the complaint.
“Before filing the complaint, some of the business owners … reached me expressing their anger at the management of the (Vietnam Town) owner association, the HOA,” Tang said. “I agreed with them and agreed to assist them. I even agreed to contribute $2,000 to the legal fund they are raising, but they did not contact me back to collect the check.”
It’s unclear what San Jose officials are doing about the problem. Business owners said they’ve gotten no response from the city. The area’s District 7 Councilmember Bien Doan, Mayor Matt Mahan and the City Manager’s Office did not respond to requests for comment.
Puzzling construction work has carved out long strips of stucco across multiple storefronts despite no visible structural cracks. Photo by Brandon Pho.
Business owners say the plaza board is misusing dollars that should be going toward solutions to the plaza’s problems — and communication has been minimal. Nguyen said management once explained to him the parking garage was closed due to structural deficiencies and that they did not have the funds to make repairs.
The lawsuit, meanwhile, questions purchases the plaza board apparently could afford. Examples include the alleged payment of $162,000 for an unneeded trash compactor that wasn’t permitted by the city, and about $800,000 for unusable and unapproved sub-meters.
The lawsuit also alleges favoritism of certain businesses by the plaza board. Financial records obtained by merchants show the board charges Vietnam Town’s 36,000-square-foot North East Medical Services clinic $4,697 in annual assessments. Business owners say that’s far less than what would be proportional to its size, and is unfair to other businesses suffering from inadequate plaza management funds. The medical company is also named in the merchants’ lawsuit.
“North East Medical Services is reviewing the allegations and will respond through the legal process,” the company’s Chief Administrative Officer Paul Fox told San José Spotlight.
Tran said he opened Pho This Way in Vietnam Town two years ago.
“It’s been a very challenging situation here,” he told San José Spotlight. “I have many customers telling me they want to come to my restaurant to eat, but we don’t have any parking. They just go somewhere else and we lose lots of customers, especially on the weekends or on the holidays.”
Tran notes business has already been slow under tough economic conditions.
“This is making it a lot worse,” he said.
Contact Brandon Pho at [email protected] or @brandonphooo on X.